>> okay, we're just about ready to get started here. if everybody could gather round a little bit. my name is olson lee. i'm the director of the mayor's office of housing. and this is a great day, isn't it? >> yes, it is. >> it's a great day. and one of the things about anything that we do in san francisco is that it does take a whole village, and we have a whole village here.

and it's about a sense of partnership that we are able to celebrate. and i really want to emphasize celebration, because this is the first phase of the first phase of many projects like this in san francisco. (applause) >> and this is something that is an only in san francisco development where we're rebuilding distressed public housing for the current residents, and doing this in a way that is -- contributes to the neighborhoods. it contributes to the health and welfare of the existing families and invites new families and creates complete neighborhoods. and only in san francisco are we willing to take on this task to really change the lives of the current residents and preserve affordable housing for all future residents so that we in san francisco have a diverse

community. so, we have a very short program today to acknowledge many of the people who have participated in this development. it has been a partnership, as we have talked about. it is a partnership of many city departments. it's been a partnership of many nonprofits and a partnership of many individuals. and it's been a partnership with the residents. and, so, i would like to start the program by introducing mayor lee, who is responsible for, among many things, the housing e trust fund which will ensure the work we start here today will continue into the future. mayor lee. (applause) >> thank you. thank you, olson. and thank you for your leadership and work on this as well. everybody, thank you for coming out today. i know it's cold, but it feels really, really warm. and as carlos and miguel just

showed me -- ask these are of course the two youngest of the five kids that alice gutierrez has. thank you very much. [cheering and applauding] >> alice, you and the family know better than i do that the bunkers that were built in the '50s that represented hunters view for many, many years were actually built for the military housing back in those years. they weren't really meant for long-term dignified respectful housing that this community deserves. and, so, you are part of the first of 25 families that are in this initial phase of a whole 107 units that will be completed in may. and thanks to all of our partners as olson continues to repay. i just want to emphasize this is the first phase. supervisor malia cohen and i are going to be working hard with many of you here today for a long time. this is something we've dreamed

of and i know you dreamed of it just in terms of being able to live in san francisco, afford it here. your kids are so happy to see their rooms and all their giants posters and the views of the bay. but we also want to assure you that we're just beginning to complete a really long-held promise, malia, that you and i and other supervisors have made. and we signalled that back when gavin was mayor. he made the bold announcement back in 2006, with the board of supervisors as a whole, that knowing that it was over $267 million of unmet infrastructure needs in the whole public housing complex, and that on an annual basis, the hud and the federal government were only able to come up with 16 million, and decreasing every year based upon their inability to get together on hud priorities, that we created hope sf. and out of that came a $95 million commitment.

i'm going to see to it that not only every penny of that comes in, but there will be more coming from the private sector because hope sf is about the public-private partnership that we have, that we should never allow our public housing residents to live in isolation from whole communities that i enjoy, that all of you enjoy so much. because when we live in our communities, guess what? we have a neighborhood business district. we have job training. we get child care. we get opportunities to go to city college and work with our education institution so that we can better ourselves. we get child care to help us support the jobs that we need to build for our families. and i know as your kids growing up, they're going to understand these things more and more as they take up more responsibilities, right now keeping you from your brand-new bedrooms clean. [laughter] >> helping mom with the dishes,

cleaning up to get your education to be the best person you want to be and go for the jobs you always wanted to have. this is the promise we have. it isn't just the physical structure. i know ms. youngblood and i know all of the people that have been invested in this dream know it for sure, that it takes a really whole community to do this. that's why we had such a great development team that came together and worked with us. john stewart, john is right here being led with his development team. we have howard here as well. you have the ridge point, which is i think the most mature of the housing managers here, ridge point's been around since '68, right? >> that's right. >> and all of you amassed together with the mayor's office of housing with hope sf, with the housing authority to make sure this dream comes alive. and, so, i'm just here today to say this is just the first of

many announcements. we've got three phases just at hunters view. now, hunters view was seen only as a pilot project. and if you see the smiles on this family's faces and the other 25, it's working. this pilot project is working. it's working not just because of the physical rebuild, but the care that hope sf has is about the lives and improvements of those lives. we had residents of hunters view involved in every stage of this project, looking for job training, looking to be part of this, looking to help move in and being part of the establishment. and, so, they weren't just going to be sitting back, receiving the benefits of new housing. they're going to be involved in the actual aspects of it. and that's why it's so important to know that it's not about building the physical rebuilding of a place. it's about the investment in these lives and building their lives as we go along the way. doug schoomaker knows this. he was there from the beginning

before olson. and olson was really working hard at the redevelopment. now we call it the commission on community investment and infrastructure. and we want to say that word a lot. because, yes, it's still the redevelopment promise that we had, but it's much more than that. and we want to get away from the old negative legacies that redevelopment had with many members of our community in san francisco, on to investment and infrastructure, investing in people, investing in their lives. as we rebuild physically here. you're also going to see a lot more parks, open space. you're going to see a community center here. you're going to see people that will see employment training as their way forward, not their way out. and people are going to want to live here. there are people that are going to want to buy the market rate housing that's going to be built here right next door and in and around the area.

the affordable rental housing that will go up, integrated with the public housing, and you're going to see a reinvested management of all of the housing so that everybody sees their role being played out here. from the residents, to the managers, to the social service providers, to the businesses that will want to be here because they'll know they'll interact with residents very positively. these are, in my opinion, the best views the city can offer. amen. (applause) >> and it begins with the most beautiful people that live right here in this area, that no longer see suffering as part of their living environment, but see progress going forward. this is the promise of hope sf. this is personally what i recognize, what gavin started with his -- with the board of supervisors and make a big promise. but i get the lucky opportunity to see it through. i get to see the smiles of the

people that are moving in and see their hopes continued. and again, it's the first of three phases for this project, but we have plans for alice griffith, for sunnydale, for potrero hill, for west side courts, every one of these will be touched. (applause) >> not just with their own money. we're going to see to it that our private partners, too, whether it's benny house or the sf foundation, the san francisco foundation that we are working very closely with already. they're helping me raise many of the private funds that go into the training services in support of services. and, of course, even our own staff at the mayor's office of housing at the cii. we're all buoyed by this. we all know at the end of it it's such a goal for everybody to have decent living lives and environment. that's holistic, and not just a fiscal rebuild. i want to emphasize as well that we have a lot of people to

thank. and in addition to the board of supervisors and all the people that we have as partners already, i can't stop thanking constantly leader pelosi and her wonderful office staff. (applause) >> she is back there, still fighting for us on every single dime that we need to have. but, ghosh, what a fearless, dedicated leader we have in leader pelosi. she's been out here before. when we saw the ground being all kind of prepared for these verticals to go up, but she also knew that it's all about these positive lives that we're going to have. i want to thank hud. i mean, hud can be harsh, but they can also be a great partner when you get them on your side. and our d.c. office as well as our san francisco office, the hud officials are to be praised for supporting this vision. because hope sf came out of the hope 6 projects. and this was naturally led -- they started these projects as

early as areas in portland and seattle and chicago. and we looked -- we sent our staffs out there and we felt that promise was may rebut what i did back here. this is a great vision and something that i will be glad to not only engage in and support enthusiastically. we have dcyf, maria sue is here and she's got all of the great training programs. along with our director of work force housing. i saw rhonda simmons and her team. we've got a lot of different agencies engaged in here so that nobody sees us as just the physical part of the buildings going up. we've got lives. these kids want to be here. they see this as their long-term place. they're part of a community now, one that's shared by everybody. it's the responsibility of everybody to share in this as well. and, again, i want to thank not only the sf foundation, but the

enterprise community partners. they've been such a great partner with us as well. and they are working with us to make sure that the private sector and the nonprofit sector are engaged all the way through this. so, these are all of the different partners. it's complicated, yet housing authority and the way we did public housing was also complicated unnecessarily. and i know now this is the way forward. and this is what we have to do for everybody that lives in public housing. and we've got to get away from that isolation that we had been comfortable with in the past. now it can't be comfortable for anybody. the comfort level is about our future and everything else that goes with it. so, i want to thank everyone for being here. again, of course, supervisor malia cohen, you and i have got a lot of work to do. not just this year. we've got to finish phase 1. we've got to finish phase 2. we've got to finish phase iii. and we've got to give hope to everybody else that while we're

finishing these things, nothing stops us from kick starting all the other projects for public private partnership. i look forward to doing all of that very vigorously so we can have many more tearless families and other families that waited way too long for this to happen. thank you very much. (applause) >> supervisor cohen. >> well, ladies and gentlemen, fortunate for you the mayor took all my talking points. [laughter] >> that just means less time we have to stand out here in the cold. thank you, mr. mayor, for your wonderful leadership. [laughter] >> good afternoon, everyone. happy new year. >> happy new year. >> happy new year to you because today we are in the beginning part of 2013 and we are in the beginning of a transition, not just for the gutierrez family, but for a community that has been in existence for over 40 years

right here on the hill, ever since these barracks were built. we're marking the celebration today with this ceremony. but what's most important is that this is the physical manifestation of when words and policies come together, when people of like mind are focused and committed to moving one vision forward. that's why we're here today. that's why today is so important. yes, we've got a long list of people to thank and i'm -- my heart is overflowed with gratitude. but also want to give a special acknowledgment to the residents that endured the hardship of living next to a construction site. and want to recognize the -- yep. (applause) >> all right. >> want to also recognize the fact that we are in a position where the community is changing, but change doesn't mean that people are going to get lost. change doesn't mean people are going to be displaced. change doesn't mean that people

those that have passed on are going to be forgotten. as a matter of fact, what we see here is an opportunity to give thanks and be grateful for those that have come before us, that have brought us to this place where we are today because none of us are standing here on our own, an island, isolated. in fact, what we're doing here is we're building a stronger, more vibrant community. this community is going to be safe. we're going to be able to raise our children here. we are going to teach our children, our public schools are excelling and we are moving forward not individually, but collectively as one community. when times were hard, we're going to stand together. when times start to get better for all of us. so, i just want to speak blessings over you and let you know that this is, this is beautiful. this is very exciting. also want to let you know that impart of a team that will continue to work tirelessly together with not only the residents association, by the way, congratulations ms. diva.

(applause) >> we've got new leadership in the place. also want to publicly acknowledge you for the service and leadership for the many years. thank you as well. (applause) >> we have many matriarchs and patriarches that have brought us to where we are today. want to reiterate the development team, john stewart, [speaker not understood], thank you. you've had a big part of this. and enterprise community. nancy pelosi's office and staff, they've been with us lockstepfighting for dollars. our pd, our fire, our first responders, our friends and also many that work at hud, staff, residents like coordinators, the list can go on and on because we definitely need to acknowledge these, that this is a multi-, multilevel approach. i also want to pay my respects

to former supervisor sophie maxwell who also had the vision and leadership to get this project started forward. also had the foresight to tear down that power plant that was polluting our community. so, we really are where -- we are today is a culmination of small, little incremental steps that we have been taking for the last 40 years. 40 years is a long time, but now we need to think about the future and going forward and take pride and protect our investment, protect our children, shop locally, the businesses and restaurants that are happening and coming in on 3rd street. this is an exciting time, not a time for us to be fearful, but to collectively move in boldly and claim our future. thank you. (applause) >> thank you very much, supervisor. at this point, again, i want to reemphasize the importance of the leader's office, leader pelosi. and i'm not sure if there is a

representative from leader pelosi's office here today. they're probably very, very busy right now in dealing first with the fiscal cliff and other issues at washington, d.c. but the work we do here in san francisco, not only here but in all of our affordable housing, is really a partnership also with the federal government, using the tools that the leader has supported over the years, including the ara funds we received as part of this development, the low-income housing tax credits which are critical for the financing of this development, and all the other affordable housing developments in san francisco. so, again, we want to acknowledge the -- her leadership and her contribution and her support throughout her very long career for affordable housing in san francisco. at this time i'd like to introduce the president of the

tenants association, diva youngblood. and one of the things that we wanted to do in this, you know, as part of hope sf, was this was doing -- building affordable housing, not for the residents, but with the residents. and we really tried very, very hard to consult the residents in the development process. it helped with resident associations as we developed the hope sf concept. i see dwayne jones. i don't know if fred is anywhere here, but dwayne and fred and doug and matt franklin really sought to solicit a lot of input from the residents because the goal of this -- of building housing is not to, again, not to just build it for the residents, but build it with the residean